NEW YORK – The numbers are the numbers.
That is until they’re not.
Bulls coach Billy Donovan and his players know that all too well.
Even with a shaky showing in Brooklyn Friday night, the Bulls entered Saturday ranked ninth in the NBA in defensive efficiency. A ranking that wasn’t necessarily lying, but at least telling a small fib.
Donovan knows this because he has film and eyes. So while stats nerds may want to tell him one thing, he knows what he’s seen: Too many breakdowns on that end of the floor, too many easy baskets allowed.
“Half your defensive rating is what teams shoot against you, and you try and look at where they’re shooting from, what you’re going to live with,” Donovan said of the current defensive rating. “I do think as early as it is, I do think our guys are working, but it’s like the one thing that takes a little longer to come along when you are a team that is starting to play with each other, finding a chemistry with each other, it always seems the defense is always a little ahead of the offense this time of year. I try to reserve judgement.
“Now what we’re doing schematically, are we executing? We’re looking at that.”
Donovan is looking at a lot of things when it comes to his defense.
After finishing fifth in defensive efficiency in the 2022-23 campaign, there was some serious slippage in that category last season. Even with Andre Drummond and Alex Caruso atop the roster in individual defensive efficiency, the Bulls ranked 21st.
The expectation was an even bigger collapse was coming this season with Drummond and Caruso moving on, but that hasn’t been the case.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t concerns.
“Figuring out our defensive identity and who we are, that doesn’t happen overnight,” guard Josh Giddey said. “It’s going to take a little bit of time. Stats are what they are. Guys can miss shots and make your defense look really good or hit a bunch of shots and your defensive rating isn’t so great. It’s a give and take.
“I think our defense has been solid, but there’s been too many times where we break down and allow guys to get confident.”
Especially in the paint.
If there’s a blueprint to give the Bulls problems, it’s to attack them in the paint. The Nets were the latest team to carry that out.
While Donovan’s crew might be ninth overall in efficiency, they rank 29th in points in the paint allowed with 56.3 per game. Brooklyn put up 66 points in there.
“I thought we had a hard time guarding (Nets players) off the dribble,” Donovan said. “We’ve got to get better there, we’ve got to help those guys, whether it’s through different schemes or individual pride or shrinking the floor a little bit.”
“Pride” was a good place to start.
Individual pride to get in front of an opposing player with the ball, making sure the blow-bys are limited and outside shots contested.
“I think it’s about having a level of pride,” guard Ayo Dosunmu said. “Having pride in wanting to guard. You don’t want to just be labeled a team that’s playing fast and giving up 125 points on the other end, so that’s something I take pride in. Being a two-way player, competing on that side of the ball, push my teammates to try and get the most out of them because we have a lot of talented players that can play defense.
“It’s all about bringing it each and every night. Ultimately, we can do that, we’ve shown we can be an elite defensive team, but now it’s all about sustaining it. I think defense is a choice. I think everybody is capable of playing defense. It’s all about how you want to be labeled, in my opinion.”